ML20195D444

Informs Commissioners of Schedule & Resources Required to Complete New STS as Well as Reduce Backlog of in-house Tech Spec Review

ML20195D444
Person / Time
Issue date:	10/28/1988
From:	Stello V NRC OFFICE OF THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR FOR OPERATIONS (EDO)
To:
Shared Package
ML20195D423	List: ML20195D419 ML20195D431 ML20195D444
References
TASK-PII, TASK-SE SECY-88-304, SECY-88-307, NUDOCS 8811070011
Download: ML20195D444 (5)

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_ POLICY ISSUE October 28, 1988 SECY-88-307 For: The Commissioners From: Victer Stello, Jr.

Executive Director for Operations

Subject:

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS IMPROVEMENT PROGRAM

Purpose:

To inform the Commissioners of the schedule and resources required to complete new Standard Technical Specifications (STS) as well as reduce the backlog of in-house technical specifications reviews.

Background:

The staff briefed the Commission on the status of the Technical Specifications Improvement Program (TS!P) on June 20, 1988. An important element of the improvement program is the development of complett.ly new sets of STS by each of the utility owners groups.

As a result of that briefing, the Commission issued a Staff Re-

- quirements Memorandum, dates July 6, 1988, (

Reference:

M8806208) requesting information related to the development of the new STS in the following four areas:

1. Industry's schedular commitments for early transmittal of its proposed new STS.

2. The staff's schedule for submitting a final policy state-fnent on technical specifications.

3. The magnitude of the staff's backlog of in-house technical specifications reviews and the resource requirements to reduce the backlog.

4 The resource requirements for timely revir.ws of the industry's proposed new STS.

Contact:

Edward J. Butcher, NRR 49-21183 l

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Each of these four areas is discussed separately below:

Discussion: 1. Industry's schedular commitments for early transmittal  ;

of its proposed new ST5.

The owners groups have presented the following schedule through the NUMARC STS Improvement Coordination Group.

Draf ts of new STS are to be submittad by subject areas '

which address related portions of Sections 3 and 4 of the technical specifications. The final proposals, each of

- which consists of a complete set of new STS for the respec.

tive NSSS vendor owners groups plants, are to be submitted as topical reports. While NUMARC and the owners groups are '.

making their best efforts to meet the scheduled dates, they have stated that the dates are subject to change. j prior to making a final decision on the acceptability of  ;

the new STS, the staff and the owners groups feel it is necessary to gain some experience with their implementation by reviewing plant specific technical specifications for lead plantt. Following submittal of proposed new STS,  ;

lead plants for each owners group are to sublait plant specific amendments to convert to new STS. -

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ORAFT S'UBMITTAl.S SCHEDULED DATE i

Use and Application October 1988 Reactor November 1988 Electrical February 1989  ;

Instrumentation March 1989 ECCS  !

Containment [

Refueling Operations No drafts scheduled  !

RCS at this time j Plant Systems FINAL SUBMITTALS SCHEDULED DATE

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Entire STS Topical Reports April 1989 Revised Technical Specifications Five months following i for lead plants. STS topical reports.  !

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2. Staf f's schedule for submitting a final policy statement on technical specifications.

The staff plan, in accordance with the Staff Require-ments Memorandum, is to submit a final policy state-ment three menths following industry's final new STS submittels. Consistent with industry's schedule, the staff is scheduled to submit the final policy statement on June 30. 1989.

3. The magnitude of the staff's backlog of in-house technicalspecificationsreviewsandtheresjurce requirements to reduce the backlog.

There currently is a backlog; i.e., inventory of about 750 technical specifications amendeent requests out of a total licensing action inventory of about 3000 items.

The inventory has remained fairly constant because, with the resources available, we have only been able to process acendment requests at a rate about equal to that of their influx. in order to assure that saf ety is not adversely af fected by resource limitations while the arendment requests are processed, the staff has established a priority ranking

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system for all NRR licensing actions based on safety signi-ficance. Technical Specifications change requests are incluced in this priority ranking system.

To reduce the inventory of technical specifications amendment requests by. for example. 200 per year, it is estimated that NRC resources of about 10 to 15 additional atreet FTE would be required to be applied exclusively to technical spect-fications amendrent requests. This estimate is based on the assurption that the rate of incoming change requests will remain constant and will not increase as the current inventory is decreased.

The ongoing TSIP is expected to af fect the inventory in two ways. increasing it during the early years and decreasing it in the long term. During the implerentation stage of the TSIP, a signifIcant number of individual arendment reauests for line-item icproverants could be received. This influx could cause a measurable increase in the license arendrent inventory. This cossible increase in the inventory would be worked off during the irpierentation of the TSIP. Cerpletinn of the TSIP is expected to significantly reduce the influx of future acendment recuests and thereby make resources available to work on further reduction of the inventory.

4 Implementation of the proposed new STS will reduce individual technical specifications and the influx of their related amenoments by about 40%. This 40% reduction will also eliminate about Si to 10% of the existing inventory. Line. item improvements to the specifications that remain in the STS will contribute to a further reduction in the influx of amendment requests. For example, removal of organization charts from technical specifications will reduce related amendments by about 0.5 per plant per year, and the removal of cycle specific variables will reduce the number of reload amendments required.

Based on all of these considerations, the staff concludes that the TSIP is an important component in controlling the inventory of in. house technical specifications reviews.

4. The resource requirements for timely reviews of the industry's proposed new 5T5.

The resource requirements are estimated to be 12 to 15 direct FTE. Additional resource requirerents to review the five lead plant conversions to the new STS are about 5 direct FTE. Resources for both the new STS and the lead plant con-versions are available in the NRR budget for FY89 and FY90.

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in addition to direct FTE contracted technical assistance is estirated to cost $250.000 for the four sets of STS and

$50,000 for each of the five lead plants. Total contracted technical assistance is therefore estimated to be $500.000.

These funds are also available in the NRR budget for FY89 and FY90.

Although conversion to riew STS is voluntary, it is anticipated that, subsequent to the lead plant conversions, there will be about 70 to 80 additional plants that will convert to new STS.

These additional conversions should commence in FY90 (as the first lead plant conversions are completed) and should continue into FY97 Resource requirements for each of these conversions are estimated to be a little less than 1 direct FTE and about

$50,000 for contracted technical assistance.

Direct FTE are available in the FY90 budget to start work on additional conversions. While budget projections have not been made beyond FY90, some resources for the conversions in each fiscal year will be provided f rom savings realized f rom previous years conversions to the new STS.

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1 It is also anticipated that resources for at least part of the  !

new STS review work and plant specific conversions will be '

provided from savings realized from line-item improvements.

The staf f plans to place this Information Paper in the Public  ;

Docueent Room. .

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